


oh roses, they don't mean a thing

by troublemaker (shoseilovemail)



Category: JO1 (Japan Band)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kissing, M/M, Psychological Horror, Ren is a florist, Roses, Trophy spouse Takumi, and an asshole, but Rich, inspired by a song, we need to popularize this tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:55:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26042302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shoseilovemail/pseuds/troublemaker
Summary: Like a broken record, he recites.I love you. I love you. I love you.Takumi never replies, just waits for Ren to lean back in and press the restart button again.or, Ren sends Takumi a rose every day, but the roses have lost their meaning long time ago.
Relationships: Kawanishi Takumi/Kawashiri Ren
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15





	oh roses, they don't mean a thing

He opens his eyes with the first sunrays. Pushes himself up, pulls on a sweater and leggings, goes to the kitchen. Makes breakfast. Then, the doorbell rings.

Takumi sighs and goes to open the door, only to find a single red rose laying on the welcome mat. _Again_ , he thinks. _That's what you get for being married to a florist._

He picks the rose up and twirls it between his fingers. The thorns poke into the soft skin, but it doesn't hurt anymore.

Takumi puts the rose into the glass vase to the others, and counts. _67\. 67 days since he's been outside._

As he musters all the red roses in their cage of glass, he remembers that it's time to change the water again. So he does. And that's his life.

-

The second time Takumi hears the doorbell ring is in the evening. He knows exactly who it is.

He opens the door and Ren shuffles inside. He drops onto the couch, and Takumi sits down next to him.

"Did you dye your hair? "

Ren nods and flaunts his grey-blue hair. "It looks good, huh? "

Takumi nods quickly. Then silence. Until (hesitatingly), the younger speaks up again. "I... I want to dye my hair blue, too. "

But his husband shakes his head disapprovingly. He tilts Takumi's chin up with one finger, and strokes his hair with another. "No, I'd like you to keep your hair red like this. It reminds me of a rose. " A smirk. _Roses. Roses._

"Besides, for that you'd have to go outside . And you know you _can't_. "

People say that the eyes always mirror one's true emotions, but in moments like this, Takumi can't read Ren at all. He stares into those fox-like eyes, and they're just deep brown-black. Nothing inside. Not even a shimmer of light.

Ren exhales, but says nothing. Yet, Takumi means that he can hear a faint whisper in his ear, and closes his eyes. _Just like a rose, Takumi. Just like my rose._

"Alright ", Ren says, but Takumi still doesn't open his eyes. _I don't want to see it._ He feels something on his lips, an all too familiar sensation. He gives in, because he can't do anything else. And that's his life.

-

Ren swings the door open, with maybe too much force (but it's just one of the other tiny things that assert his status, so _he does not care_ ).

It makes all eyes in the store fall on him, just the way Ren wants it. Yes, he's that important, as rich as he is.

He gets to work with the flowers, and feels the stares from co-workers. But he's used to it.

"Hey, how's it going with your trophy rose? "

At some point Junki's cheerful voice breaks the morning silence. Junki is probably the only person that regularly talks to Ren. He's... nice.

Ren picks out one of the roses in front of him and twirls it around between his fingers. "Well. He's not left the house in more than 2 months now. "

"Whoa dude, that's crazy! ", Junki exclaims. "Isn't that totally fucking him up? "

"Mhm " Ren just hums in response. "But it doesn't matter. He's... just a rose. " _One of many_ , he doesn't say. _One of many trophies, pretty little things he can stuff into a bag and show off at family meetings._ His family's always been like that. Highly competitive, stupidly rich and with a sense for collecting rarities. Everyone knows it.

Ren stands up with a sigh, and takes the rose to the back area to wrap it up. He doesn't notice Junki following him until the younger speaks. "And you're sending him another rose today... "

Ren hums yet again. "Don't want him to lose his sense of time in that big house. " _It's all he has there._

Junki just stares at him with an indecipherable expression.

The older smirks. "Because I'm all he needs. "

-

Takumi's read a book once. About a boy who travels the universe. He comes from a small planet with a single rose on it, protected by a glass dome. It resembles his life, in some way.

When Ren isn't at work - so, on weekends - he travels. To all kinds of places, goes to see people and takes things with him here and there. He wakes Takumi up deep into the night when he rings the doorbell, to place another obscure object in one of the glass cabinets.

It's kind of a routine, like everything in Takumi's life.

Ren also never forgets to let a rose be delivered to the doorstep every morning. First Takumi's wondered why, but one evening Ren himself stood behind the door, expressionless but puts on a smile as he sees Takumi. He gives him the rose and then continues to kiss Takumi senseless until the next morning.

Between kisses, Ren takes short breaths, puts on his usual smile and says the same three words with his red, chapped lips coloured by Takumi's lip tint.

Like a broken record, he recites.

 _I love you. I love you. I love you._

Takumi never replies, just waits for Ren to lean back in and press the restart button again.

And that says it all.

-

Sometimes Takumi takes a rose out of its vase and lets it rest in his hand. Sometimes he grasps them tighter, let's the thorns dig deep into his skin until tiny red blobs come out. Sometimes he cleans up afterwards, sometimes he doesn't. It's not like it matters anyways.

After being told to be one for months, Takumi's eventually started to feel like a rose. Like the little prince's rose, except the prince is a tyrant and he's not protected by his glass dome, but trapped inside it.

Takumi stares at the circular marks on his hands and wonders when he'll wither.

One could mean that Ren takes _care_ of him, always giving him the roses every day and coming back from travels with exotic presents every other day. Takumi gets the best of clothing, food, housing. But no freedom.

_And there, all the roses lose their meaning._

Ren does this all because he loves Takumi, but now he's just like a broken machine, trying to keep Takumi in his cage while doing the same things to him every other night, whispering the same words, delivered by the same red flower.

Takumi's fallen out of love a long time ago. But there are no days anymore, only roses.

Some of the early ones have withered, and Takumi wonders when it'll be his turn. It's cruel, but he doesn't think that Ren will realize any other way. That his pretty little red rose doesn't want to be one anymore, because the roses have lost their meaning long time ago.

-

Maybe it's ten, twenty days, a month later, but one morning Takumi doesn't receive a rose. He gets this oddly, _unsettling_ familiar feeling that confirms itself when Ren stands on the doorstep that evening. With a full bouquet of deep red roses.

He smiles ever so charmingly. "Look, I've bought these _just for you_. "

Takumi nods and thanks him. _So many_ , he thinks. _So many meaningless roses._

Ren steps inside and holds out the bouquet to the younger. "Roses... they just always remind me of you. So pretty. ", he says.

One step closer. Takumi doesn't move. Ren lays the bouquet aside. Another step. And another.

Bow Takumi feels the other's breath on his face, it's still cold from outside. _Cold as the heart._

Takumi parts his lips to say something, but before he can Ren closes the gap between them, and Takumi shuts down.

At some point his back crashes into the wall and he feels out of breath, but he doesn't care. _It doesn't matter._

Maybe he even actually says that. Whispers it, but his breaths are cut short, and after a while he gives up on trying.

Ren however continues saying that _he loves him, so much_ , but Takumi responds with just his lips. _Nothing matters._

-

Takumi wakes up to the sunrays as every other day, but today it's different. He's not lying in his bed but Ren's king sized one. His whole body hurts and feels kind of sore, and he means to smell a hint of rose. Through the open door he can see the bouquet from yesterday, tossed aside as meaningless as it is.

_Ah, Ren came home yesterday with the bouquet and then..._

Takumi closes his eyes, remembers all the sensations he's shut out last night. Rightfully. He doesn't want to feel them. After so many days trapped with Ren, he became numb.

He hears a rustling far away but keeps his eyes closed. It comes closer, closer, until it's right beside his ear.

_"Morning, Takumi. "_

Ren's whisper goes through all of his body and makes him shudder, but he suppresses it. More rustling. A feeling on his lips.

Takumi opens his eyes and there's Ren kneeling over him, smiling, holding a rose onto the younger's mouth.

Takumi squints his eyes. _"I love you, so much, Takumi. "_

Ren leans in to kiss him briefly and then disappears.

Takumi repeats these words in his mind. _I love you._ Over and over again, until he hears the front door click. He sighs, the takes the rose, and crushes it with his hand. The petals drop onto his bare chest, where the traces of Ren are found. _Again._

All those feelings, all the pain, all the sweet words, but Takumi?

It's all repeated like a record every day, each rose being the button pressed to start anew. That's the glass Takumi's trapped in, with a broken recorder calked Ren. Each day another rose thrown in until he loses his sanity. But Ren keeps thinking that it's okay, because Takumi loves him. But he doesn't.

Takumi twirls the stem between his fingers, thorns brushing the soft skin. _He doesn't understand_ , he thinks, _that all these roses don't mean a thing anymore._

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [ wild roses by of monsters and men ](https://youtu.be/lyjgw3gczgM)  
> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment or find me on [ cc ](https://curiouscat.qa/Shoseilover) or [ twt ](https://twitter.com/shoseilovemail)


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